Anyone who remembers the horrors that de Gaulle inflicted on French Algeria when he handed over that territory to the Algerian terrorists in 1962 will find remarkable similarities between what was done then by the French leader and what is being done now in Gaza by Sharon.

In the case of French Algeria, a million Europeans – Christians and Jews – were forced to abandon their farms, vineyards, businesses, schools, churches and synagogues and take to the boats for metropolitan France. It was a surrender of Christian civilization to the Muslims and set the stage for the slow takeover of France itself by Islam.

De Gaulle had been brought to power in 1958 to defend French Algeria and its million French citizens, which included many loyal Muslims. In Algiers, he made a powerful speech in which he told these citizens, “Je vous ai compris,” “I have understood you.” And then he proceeded to betray them in a brutal and arrogant way, destroying the most patriotic men in his army and replacing them with traitors. Of course, he had the backing of the communists and the left. As for the French in Algeria, they were labeled “right wing extremists.”

The same situation now exists in Israel, where Sharon has had to rely on the support of the left to carry out his plan to evacuate the Jews from Gaza. He is willing to destroy their homes, farms, schools and industries for the same reason that de Gaulle destroyed French Algeria: He didn’t think it was worth the effort to save it. The result since then has been an unhindered march of several million Muslims into Europe. Thus de Gaulle destroyed the work of over a hundred years to make Algeria a part of the French Republic, and bring its people under the protection of an enlightened Christian civilization.

France had invaded North Africa in the 1840s to put a stop to the piracy and kidnappings of the Barbary Arabs. After that was done, Europeans from France, Italy and Spain settled there and built a thriving economy. And when oil was discovered, it made French Algeria all the more valuable. But when Algerian terrorists launched their campaign of “national liberation,” they did it with the help of the Soviet Union and the entire communist world, including the French Communist Party. De Gaulle, whom we suspect was sympathetic to socialism, surrendered it all to the Reds.

Patriotic Frenchmen saw it all as a great betrayal. That is why there were attempts by former army officers to assassinate de Gaulle. But they never succeeded because the majority of the French people either approved of the betrayal or simply shut their mouths and accepted what had become inevitable.

In Israel, polls are taken almost daily to show that the majority of Israelis approve of Sharon’s plan to destroy the Jewish settlements in Gaza. But there is growing resistance to the plan, even among army men, because it looks like an abject surrender to Arab terrorists without any gain or benefit to Israel’s security. In fact, some Israelis see it as the beginning of the dismantling of the Jewish state itself, which seems to have lost its Zionist zeal, its biblical mission.

Meanwhile, de Gaulle’s legacy has become the Islamization of France. Brigitte Bardot, the famous French film star, wrote a book in 2002, “A Scream in the Silence,” about the Muslim takeover of France. She wrote: “I am against the Islamization of France … For centuries our forefathers, the ancients, our grandfathers, our fathers gave their lives to chase all successive invaders from France.” But today the French government acquiesces to its growing Islamic population, tolerating growing anti-Semitism in order not to offend its Muslim citizens. The will to survive as Christian France no longer exists.

The Jewish settlers in Gaza represent a Jewish will not only to survive, but to overcome tremendous obstacles to their success. To destroy them is to replace the will to survive with the will to surrender. The great tragedy of their destruction is just beginning, yet some of the Jewish farmers in Gaza are already planting the seeds for their next harvest, oblivious to what Sharon intends to do to them.

The horrible memories of what de Gaulle did to French Algeria are virtually unknown to the people of Israel. Thus, its hard lessons have not been learned. But as the philosopher Santayana once remarked, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

Editor’s note: “ISRAEL BETRAYED?” – the July issue of WND’s acclaimed monthly Whistleblower magazine – is devoted entirely to an in-depth exploration of the controversial forced removal of thousands of Jewish residents from Gaza planned for August, and the likely creation of a Hamas-run terror state many believe will follow. Read more about “ISRAEL BETRAYED?”